


A Bit like the Sun, a Bit like the Moon

by rubyissherlocked



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Hurt Sherlock, Johnlock - Freeform, Johnlock Fluff, M/M, POV John Watson, Pre-Season/Series 03
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-07
Updated: 2014-08-07
Packaged: 2018-02-12 03:31:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,018
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2094087
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rubyissherlocked/pseuds/rubyissherlocked
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>People make cheesy metaphors.</p><p>John avoids his feelings.</p><p>Sherlock plays the violin.</p><p>That's pretty much it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Bit like the Sun, a Bit like the Moon

**Author's Note:**

> Just a short, somewhat fluffy fic that's been on my mind for a while!  
> Oh, and it pretty much ignores all of season 3.  
> First fic, please be kind!  
> This was written and posted from my phone, so please excuse any formatting errors :$ Comments and kudos are much appreciated <3
> 
> Of course, I own nothing and everything belongs to the rightful creators.

People always compared them to the sun and moon. John was usually the sun, of course, but that was only because compared to Sherlock, he was the epitome of all things bright and sunny. To outsiders, Sherlock was some sort of wild beast that John had just barely managed to tame. To them, he was pyschotic, insane, a mad man on the edge of snapping, but to John, he was something else all together.

The comparison had never felt quite right, but sometimes, before Sherlock and John had become Sherlock AND John, John would agree with them. Sometimes, on bad days, he would be stunned by how cold Sherlock could suddenly become. His temper, John could handle. It was endearing really, the way he would pout his lips, the sullen expression on his face before flopping melodramatically on the couch, flinging insults at inanimate objects. He reminded John of a sulky, yet still charmingly adorable, child being denied the thing it wanted most, like ice cream, or a new toy. In Sherlock's case, it was usually a good old fashioned murder. Sure, it made John want to tear his hair out, but anger he could deal with. Anger was simple, ordinary. Anger made Sherlock more human, more real, more alive.

It was only when he would turn icey and distant that John got bothered. At those times, it seemed as if all the emotion had been sucked out of him and all that remained was a machine, capable of manipulating and computing, but not of feeling anything but disdain and contempt for mere mortals like John. And the part John hated most was that he would never see it coming.

He remembered once at a crime scene, just a few weeks after they'd become flatmates, when Sherlock had said one of those things that made Lestrade look uncomfortable, Donovan roll her eyes and Anderson scoff. One of those cruel comments that make everyone else look anywhere but directly at him. Made them sneak covert glances at each other, whisper behind their hands about the lunatic and afterwards, express pity for John, who seemed perfectly normal, but had somehow fallen into his trap. The kind of throwaway comment that made John ache in a place dangerously close to his heart, because they made it blindingly clear that Sherlock did not care. For anyone. Including him.

This time, when Sherlock looked at him, puzzled, and asked "not good?" tilting his head in a way that reminded John of a energetic puppy that's broken something and can't quite understand what they did wrong, John just exhaled sharply and turned away.

They'd had a fight that night. The crime had went unsolved so Sherlock was irritable, and John was still trying to process Sherlock's comment so he was irritable. Not to mention that as soon as the cab pulled up to Baker street, Sherlock had immediately bounded out, leaving John to pay the fare, again.  
The fight was messy, but quick, and ended with John storming up to his room and Sherlock clattering around with some experiment for half the night.  
In the morning, they pretended it had never happened. Or John did anyway, Sherlock may have actually forgotten. Or more likely, deleted it.

~ ~ ~ 

This happened a lot over the next months. Each time, it started with an out of place comment from Sherlock that showed just how little he cared. That's what scared John. Because John did care. Alot. About Sherlock. And what made John so different from everyone else, that Sherlock would magically start feeling things like everyone else, that he would care about John too? What made John so special, why should he be an exception?

After the "Will caring about them help save them?" conversation, things got a little easier. It stung at the time, of course it did. John had some strong feelings (he had decided a long time ago that whatever these feelings were, that's all he'd call them until he did some soul searching and actually gave the "feelings" a name - a decidedly uninviting prospect) for a man who thought caring lead to destruction and sentiment was humanity's doom. Go figure. But it did make things easier to accept. Just a little bit.

Then there were danger nights. Danger nights were different.  
It wasn't as if Sherlock didn't care then. It was as if he cared too much, so much that his mind simply couldn't deal, wiped it's self clean and went disturbingly blank while trying to repair the damage that the dreaded sentiment had caused.  
Sherlock was empty on danger nights. Drained. There was no life in him. He would completely shut John out and retreat into his own mind, leaving John frustrated and helpless.

Yes, danger nights were different. The first few times Mycroft had to notify him, but soon John began to pick up on it himself. The first signal of an approaching danger night was always was the noticable absence of the violin.

But danger nights were rare and they always passed- sometimes it took a day, sometimes more, sometimes just an hour or two, before Sherlock was back to normal and bouncing off the walls in boredom. But pass they did, and nothing ever made John happier than waking up at 3am to the familiar violin strains of what he had mentally dubbed as his own song. Vain, perhaps, to think that the song Sherlock played everytime he got over a slump was based on himself, but hey - a guy could dream. It was slow, and it was haunting, but beautiful. Near the end, the chords always started pick up, like hope and happiness were almost about to break through whatever invisible barrier that Sherlock had built, but just not quite yet. Sherlock never finished it though, always cut it off before it got too light.

These were the times that John agreed with the outsiders about them. Sherlock was dark, mysterious, untouchable, cold, yet still had a kind of erethral beauty - like the moon. And if John was supposed to be his conductor of light, then he supposed that he was the sun.

But that was just sometimes.

Sometimes John thought quite the opposite.

Sometimes Sherlock was so vibrant, so alive, that John couldn't tear his eyes away from him. When he was rattling off his latest deductions, he was alive. When he was laughing after a particularly thrilling chase through London, he was alive. When he was positively vibrating with excitment during a case, he was alive. When he was sleeping, his face innocent and childlike, chest rising and falling, he was alive.

That one was John's favourite. Of course, it was also the rarest - the man barely slept! But when he did, sprawled across the couch, his dark eyelashes fluttering, sometimes talking in his sleep... It was the most peaceful thing John had ever seen.

So, sometimes, John thought Sherlock was more like the sun - bright, energetic, and radiant. Mostly doing good things, but also capable of great harm if you got too close - a fact John lamented on an almost daily basis.

He was both chaotic and calm, warm and cold, lifeless and so full of life that everything else paled in comparision.

Quite a contradiction, that man was.

~ ~ ~ 

After the fall, something changed between them. It was different. Sherlock was both kinder and crueler, more human, but also less. Once John had moved back in to Baker street, he began noticing little things. How Sherlock didn't jump at serial killers anymore. The wary look on his face whenever they were just out and about in London. How he only ever played melancholy music on his violin, but never John's song. The empty look in his eyes when he thought John couldn't see him. The cracks were starting to show, and John was scared that one day Sherlock would crumble into pieces that John couldn't put back together again.

It got worse before it got better.

There were more danger nights than John cared to remember and more restless nights full of worry than he could count, but got better it did, and the morning he woke up to Sherlock playing his song was one of the happiest of his life. He had added more to it too -the song now rose and fell dramatically, and then trembled and quivered, frail and breakable, but lighter notes subtley interwoven through it gave John a faint sense of hope, a feeling that everything would be alright. It still didn't have a resolution though. Still ended mid-note, leaving the listener anxious for more.

After things got better, there was another shift in their relationship, a good one this time.

It had started when Sherlock shifted the tone in his song, the one John liked to think was conposed for him. The notes became a little sweeter, a little softer, the question of hope became certain, and a sort of quiet, yet powerful, joy radiated from each strain. John had heard it in the middle of the nght, and listened from his bed, internally debating, should he go downstairs? Should he ignore it, go back to sleep? Something had told him, this song, this moment, was important. And so he'd gotten up from bed, and gone downstairs. The playing paused when the stairs creaked, but then continued. Once John had gotten to the sitting room, Sherlock ignored him at first, facing the window, away from John.

"Sherlock."

He ignored him and kept playing. So John listened. And he waited. Listened to their story, told through the music of the violin. Waited for the final, soft notes to fade into nothing. When they did, he had waited again, for Sherlock to set down his violin, waited for him to turn around, waited for him stop bustling around and pretending that this wasn't a big deal.

"Is that the end of it then?" John had asked, genuinely not knowing the answer. Because the resolution of the song was delicate and sweet and happy, which was usually not Sherlock's style. It was almost -dare he say it? - romantic. And that both confused John, and made him insanely hopeful.

"Depends." was Sherlock's brief reply. He still wasn't looking at John.

"On?" John tried desperately to make eye contact.

"What happens next, I suppose."

And when Sherlock finally looked at John, they both knew what would happen next before it did.

No words were needed.

~ ~ ~

After that night, things didn't change much. Things were more comfortable, easier. John was allowed to push a stray curl out of Sherlock's face now, allowed to doze off on his shoulder in the cab on their way home, allowed to just stare at him whenever he wanted, allowed to pull him close and kiss him at a crime scene when he was being his usual bloody brilliant self.

And that's where they were now, John supposed, as he idly twirled Sherlock's hair as the detective chattered excitedly about a promising case, from his spot laying on the couch, head in John's lap. Yes, John could definitely get used to this.

~ ~ ~

The other day at Scotland Yard, after another sun and moon comment by a well meaning officer, Lestrade had pulled John aside and said "You know, it's not like that, it's really not. The sun and moon never meet, they never touch each other, you can never even see them together. You two are different. You're like two shooting stars that collided, and got bloody lucky that you didn't create a black hole or something equally awful, but something amazing instead. What're those things called again?"

"Supernova, and while the sentiment behind your stunningly cheesy metaphor is almost close to moving, it's extremely scientifically inaccurate, and therefore, pretty meaningless", Sherlock tossed over his shoulder before he continued examining evidence.

Lestrade scowled. "Yeah, well, it works okay? You work, I mean. The two of you. Together." He scratched the back of his neck awkwardly.

The corner of Sherlock's mouth turned up in a smile.

John caught his eye, smiled back, and replied.  
"I couldn't agree more."

And he really couldn't.

 


End file.
